


Point 5 Seconds

by Crimbat7



Category: Batman (Comics), Red Hood and the Outlaws (Comics), Robin (Comics)
Genre: Bruce is being a parent, Damian is being a turd but like in character, Gen, Teaching moments
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-04
Updated: 2020-05-04
Packaged: 2021-03-01 21:13:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,483
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23993575
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crimbat7/pseuds/Crimbat7
Summary: Bruce invites his youngest son to learn from a bar fight. It goes about as well as you expect.
Comments: 1
Kudos: 56





	Point 5 Seconds

**Author's Note:**

> Tom King? Don't know him

“Father, why are we watching Todd fight?” Damien crossed his arms like a put upon victorian child from a Charles Dickens novel and glanced to the side. “Tt. It’s not like I can’t take him one on one. In fact, I think Brown has more finesse in her form than Todd.”

Bruce didn’t give him a second glance, instead focusing on zooming and enhancing the video he’d acquired through a bugged bar in the wards of Gotham. “Watch, Damian.”

Agitated, not unlike a bowl of jell-o in an earthquake, Damien joined his father at the bat computer, which had been recently updated so it had no more apple hardware or software. This had been at the recommendation of Stephanie Brown and Barbara Gordan, who both hated the company’s practices as well as how obnoxious it is to repair their equipment.

Bruce hit the spacebar and pointed to the screen while his son glared at it with a level of contempt.

The door flew open, breaking the lock and the hinges. The Red Hood rolled in under the gun fire like a hot wheel under the sofa. A smoke screen vented from his helmet, shielding him the accuracy of their glocks and ensuring any shot they tagged him with was glancing if that.

Jason reached for the head of one of the crooks firing at him and slammed it into a brass bar, knocking him out. He held the man for a moment as a deterrent against making him a target so the enemy would not open fire on what Jason expected to be his friend.

Dropping the lowlife, Jason then grabbed at a half empty glass mug and, in the same fluid motion as the contents therein, dodged a bullet and threw it at the next assailant in line. The glass sunk into his face, immediately disinfecting the wound with cheap beer.

A chorus of bullets rang out and the choir was an UZI submachine gun but it wasn’t a song Jason hadn’t danced too before. He ran up the bar stool, upon the bar itself, and with 240 pounds of body armor and gadgets, elbow dropped on the last suit in the last bar one would expect to find a suit, knocking him out faster than a new 18 year old at a college kegger.

Jason rose from the whiskey stained planks and began almost strutting towards the more nicely dressed target with purpose. The video had more to play but it ended there.

There was a silence hanging over them much like the bats in that same cave. Bruce looked down at his son. Damian looked up to his father. Bruce gestured over to the screen and Damian sighed.

“He was treating it like a bar fight, Father,” there was a tremble his voice like his pride had been wounded. “Drake is trying to always be perfect in his forms on a technical level. Grayson would have never gotten hit. Duke would have separated all of them one by one. Cain would have done it in a third the time and Brown would have improvised a way to keep out of the line of the fire from all three of them while still having more finesse than Todd.”

Bruce sighed and turned back to the monitor, only this time playing it at 50% speed. “Watch, Damian. I need you to count how many gadgets he used.”

So Damian did at the slower pace and, to his surprise, he didn’t count any. “He didn’t use any but he still fought like it was a bar brawl!”

“Damian…” Bruce turned his chair around the axis and smiled, clasping his hands. “How long does it take to take brass knuckles out of your belt?”

“ Point 5 seconds,” he puffed out his chest.

“And how long to follow up with a knockout punch?”

“... another point 5 seconds.”

“How long did it take him to slam that man’s face into a brass bar?”

Damian crossed his arms. “... Point 5 seconds.”

“Assume it takes as long as a batarang to grab and throw. How long did it take to do the same with that glass?” Damian remained silent. “He’s not treating it like a brawl, Son. He’s using his terrain to his advantage. It’s easy to forget but a few years ago, he had me on my backheel for a few weeks. I was alone at the time with only your brother’s help but that just makes the comparison more accurate.” Damian looked down, resistant to learning from what’d been one of his father’s most personal enemies only a year ago. “Watch this,” Bruce advised, turning back around to replay the elbow drop.

“A wrestling move?” Damian scoffed. “Tt. No finesse.”

“Damian,” Bruce’s voice began sturn. “Look. He’s running up the terrain and using it to put more gravity on his strike. If I’m guessing his weight in that suit right, that’s going to be close to 250 pounds from six feet up on an approximate two inch radius point of impact on a man’s collar bone. The man will go into shock but he’s not going to die.”

“Tt. So he’s learning not to kill?” Damian pouted at the floor.

“I’m hoping that takes but that’s not the point. Jason is using his attributes to his advantage. Pound for pound, he’s probably the strongest in terms of muscle and the lazarus pits means that’s going to stick around for a while. There’s a difference between not having finesse and not having skill.” Damian remained silent, like an imaginary pomeranian that learned to shut up.

Bruce turned back around and began to play on seven more different windows one video each for Cassandra, Dick, Stephanie, and Jason each contrasting them in situations that they thrive in and another where they find themselves lacking.

In Cassandra’s best, Damian saw her surrounded by a small army of assassins, dodging them all like a leaf on the wind. In her worst, she was playing keep away from Mr. Freeze, who’s ice weapon covered a wide enough radius to make assaulting him a problem, along with his armor making reading him and putting a dent into him very difficult.

In Dick’s best, he was in a warehouse and was jumping from rafter to rafter, using his bird-like frame to take them all out one at a time as well as distracting him with his trademark banter. In his worst, he got caught in a conversation with his enemy, found himself surrounded and had to pull off a four gadget gambit to get out without getting hosed with AK’s.

In Stephanie’s best, there were a million variables going on in an illegal auction. In the chaos, she thrived and was able to use the ensuing anarchy to improvise something that even Bruce would have given pause too. At her worst, she found herself pinned down by machine gun fire being utilized by a professional band of well trained and disciplined mercenaries and had to jump off a building to escape a lead embalming.

And in Jason’s worst, he was fighting against an assassin with many years of experience over him and, in over estimating his abilities, had found himself on the receiving end of a beat down that, had the assassin wished it, would have ended him.

“Reading your enemies movements vs. not having readable movements. Distracting your enemy vs. distracting yourself. Improvisation vs. a better plan. Being highly skilled in the basics vs. someone picking that apart,” he put his hand on his son’s shoulder. “I’m not going to pick you apart. That’s not why I’m here. Jason’s fighting lacks finesse. You’re right on that. But what you need to take away from this is that skill can come in many forms and by learning from other’s strengths as well as your own then you all can be a better batman than me. Simply differently.”

“... So what did you need to improve on?” Damian piped up, still looking at the floor.

“Master Bruce needs to improve on communicating, not needing to be a part of every team under the sun and stars, while also hiring some more help so I can have a day off more than once a month,” A cockney voice rang out into the darkness like news of a new trilogy of Star Wars movies. “I have tea, Master Damian.”

Damian accepted the drink and, pleased it had 5 cubes of sugar, looked back up to his father. “Did you have this talk with Jason as well, Father?”

“No,” Bruce replied, smiling but still looking at his screen. “Were I to do that, he’d tell me to “piss off, old man”,” his grin grew wider which begat a beat of silence. “So instead I just ask Cass to spar with him.”

Alfred gave a disapproving smile. “It goes about as well as one can expect in most facets.”

**Author's Note:**

> I've vaguely heard of Scott Snyder, however.


End file.
